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Writing in English and French

Friday 12 October 2007, by Jim Pollard

Two languages but do you need two keyboards?


How can you switch from English to French with ease? It’s tough enough in the bar autour un verre but how do you do it without leaving your keyboard?

What is the best way to type in English and French? Do you use one keyboard set up and then learn all the short-cuts for the other language? Do you switch the keyboard layout while using the same physical keyboard? Or do you perhaps have a second keyboard plugged in?

Some programs make it easier than others. You can have the insert symbol panel in Word or the Glyphs palette in InDesign permanently open. But I haven’t found an email program that has anything like this.

Moreover, moving text from one program or platform to another often introduces errors as your carefully selected symbols are replaced with gobbledegook and Dr Dr. János Métneki becomes Dr. J¥nos M¥tnek∂.

One of my jobs is editing a multi-lingual European men’s health site so I’m frequently looking for Ø or Ë or even Œ in addition to the more familiar Ç or È. It’s enough to make you shout: why can’t they all bloody speak English!!!!! All suggestions and thoughts much appreciated.

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5 Forum messages

  • 12 October 2007 13:31, by George

    Habit maketh the man.

    I have to deal with three languages on the Mac and on the PC (the keyboard layout for Arabic is different between Mac and PC).

    But I have the three layouts (most of the French one anyway) in my head and a movement which became a twitch between "alt" and "shift" (on the PC) and "command" and "space" ) on the make to toggle between languages.

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  • 6 December 2007 01:06

    Having learnt to touch type in English (one month at secretarial school, the most useful training I have ever done) and got used to the Mac’s key combinations for accents (Alt e, e for the acute; Alt i, i for the î Alt`a for the à etc.) I get the little flags to come up on the bar at the top or bottom of the screen by ticking the relevant languages in languages preferences. Then always select the British flag, whichever keyboard I am typing on. I had to show the shop assistants in the Mac store on rue du Renard that you could actually do this. It works for email too. But forced to write in French on a PC, or in either language on a PC with an Azerty keyboard, I have severe problems.

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  • 11 December 2007 17:46, by Jacqueline

    I write in both French and English and solved the problem for myself by buying a Spanish keyboard.

    Spanish keyboards are qwerty and I need this as my brain can’t cope with azerty...but the Spanish keyboard has all the accents needed for French(these are dead letters so you type the accent and the letter afterwards) plus all Spanish letters (Ñ ñ) and punctuation ¿¿ ¡¡ and ç and Ç thrown in for free. I just go down to San Sebastian once a year when I can’t read the keys anymore. A good excuse for doing the tapas bars...

    Jacqueline

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  • 25 January 2008 14:47, by Martin Patrick

    Jan25,08

    The best solution is a swiss keyboard.

    It has all the accents for French,German and Spanish.
    The letter arrangement is QWERTZ but otherwise everything is in the same place as the English keyboard letter order.
    The aux keys such as @ are often in the same place.
    All swiss boards have at least 96 keys,many
    have more than 120.The cost is from 20 Swiss francs.
    Fancier models are around 50 Swiss francs or 30 euros.

    P MARTIN

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  • 4 July 2011 23:48, by Sarah Moortle

    I tried using a swiss keyboard, worked out well. Had a look on google for other options, but this was best.

    google

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